emotion that its import could be more truly divined from the tones in which it is pronounced, than from any information preserved by historians. A robber he has been called, and so has been dismissed from all consideration by writers, who yet have been enthusiastic for "William Walleys, that mayster was of thieves." An outlaw! as such he has been overlooked as unworthy of notice by historical writers, as though there could be no outlaw of any other character than a fugitive from some such warrant as might be issued against him in the name of her Majesty Queen Victoria, who might secrete himself in some cellar from a man called a constable, dressed in scarlet plush, with a three-cornered hat. A very different outlaw from this was Robin Hood, and one who put himself beyond the reach of very different laws from those administered under Queen Victoria, and who showed himself hostile to very different usages from any which exist now, either between castle and cottage or monarch and subject, -a man whom we can understand at all only by seeing him with his bow in his hand, and his enemies about him, only by our seeing who the persons were whom he helped, and who the men were whom he might have been willing to shoot, only by knowing what was aristocracy, and what was serfdom, what the Church was, and what the court was, and what was forest law under the first Edwards.

It is very singular how silent history has been on Robin Hood, considering how great a name, how wide a place, and how abiding a reputation he has had in England. History in England has not been of the people, or in the fourteenth century it would have been of Robin Hood. Indeed, it has not been of the people so much as it has been of geography and shifting boundaries, of royal families, their cruelties and imbecilities, and of old dates that have become almost void of meaning. Even Turner and Hallam have held Robin Hood beneath their mention. Yet really there was no man more important to their purpose; for to understand him was to understand the people of his day. During a long era, Robin Hood was, as it were, the English people, — was their hero, a man who writhed with their sufferings, hated with their hatreds, and whose motives in strife were feelings like

their own, — a man who, by skill and power, did very nearly such things as they would all of them have wished to do.

The writer who seems first to have discerned any historical significance in the life of Robin Hood was Thierry, in his History of the Norman Conquest. In the volumes of Mr. Gutch are gathered together all the ballads on Robin Hood, together with a large amount of matter, pictorial and antiquarian, illustrative of the life and locality of the famous outlaw. In Mr. Hunter's Critical and Historical Tract on the "Ballad Hero "9 we have some very precise and singular information about him, published now for the first time; and, with this guidance, we are enabled to identify Robin Hood at the court of Edward II., and also at a manorial court held at Wakefield we can hear a name called which sounds like Robin's. This tract is worthy of the author's learning and sagacity, and of the opportunities which he enjoys for research among ancient documents.

Let us now examine some of the ballads for information as to Robin Hood. But if it should be thought that, on account of their poetical form, they must be worthless as history, then let it be understood that perhaps their character is altogether misconceived; for they may not at all have been intended as poetry, in our sense of the word. Anciently ballads were often literal narratives; and if rhymes and verses seem a strange form for history, then let it be considered that ballads were narratives designed for the use of those who could not read,- histories published among the ignorant in such a way as was possible. Nor yet did a man become a subject for ballads only after he was long dead. About a living man, ballads went among his contemporaries from mouth to mouth, and from county to county, in something like the manner of a weekly newspaper. No doubt, through the oral way in which they were published, these old ballads were liable to corruption; but also, for the same cause, they were easily capable of correction, and subject to it; and certainly for some of these poems on Robin Hood there may be claimed all that Selden meant when he said that there are ballads which are of better authority than many histories.

Of the Robin Hood poems the longest and the most important is "The Lytell Geste in Eight Fyttes." The oldest copy

of it in existence is in black-letter, and was printed by Wynken de Worde, about the year 1520. It is in the language of the fourteenth century, and it sounds as though it might be an authentic account. In all probability, as a history of occurrences, it is worthy of entire trust, corroborated as it now is, after five hundred years, in the most important particulars, from the Royal Journals of the Chamber, the Fœdera, and other documents. The main part of the ballad concerns Robin Hood and a knight, who proves to be Sir Richard at the Lee in Lancashire. At the beginning of it, it is said that

"Robyn was a proude outlawe,

Whyles he walked on grounde;

So curteyse an outlawe as he was one
Was never none y-founde."

It is stated to be Robin Hood's custom never to dine without company. Also it is told,

"A good maner than had Robyn

In londe where that he were,
Every daye or he woulde dyne
Thre messes wolde he here:

"The one in the worshyp of the fader,
The other of the holy goost,

The thyrde was of our dere lady,
That he loved of all other moste.

"Robyn loved our dere lady;

For doute of dedely synne,

Wolde he never do company harme

That ony woman was ynne."

Little John asks his master for directions for their conduct.

"Ther of no fors, sayd Robyn,

We shall do well ynough; ·

But loke ye do no housbonde harme
That tylleth with his plough;

"No more ye shall no good yeman,

That walketh by grene wode shawe,

Ne no knyght, ne no squyer,

That wolde be a good felawe.

"These bysshoppes, and these archebysshoppes,
Ye shall them bete and bynde ; -

The hye sheryfe of Notynghame,

Hym holde in your mynde."

So Little John, Much the miller's son, and William Scathelock, go out to look for a guest for Robin. At last, in a gloomy spot, near the old Watling Street, they meet a knight of no proud look, with his hood hanging over his eyes, and riding with one foot in the stirrup and with the other waving loose. Little John kneels to him, and invites him into the woods, to dine with his master. When he is brought to Robin Hood, they wash and wipe themselves, and sit till dinner; when they have plenty of bread and wine, and deer's umbles, swans, pheasants, and every little bird of the brier. After he has dined, the knight remarks that he has not had such a dinner for three weeks; and he promises that, if ever he should come into that neighborhood again, he will return his host's kindness. "Grammercy," says Robin, "when I have had one dinner, I was never so greedy as to be already craving another. But pay for your dinner now before you go. Pay for you I cannot, because I am only a yeoman, and you are a knight." The knight answers, that he has nothing which he can offer for shame, and that indeed he has only ten shillings in his coffer. Little John spreads his mantle on the ground, and finds in his coffer only half a pound. Then Robin remarks about the knight, that his clothes are very thin, and he asks him to drink more wine and tell his history. The knight explains, that he has been at great expense on account of his son, who has had the misfortune to slay a knight of Lancashire and his squire; that he has therefore been obliged to mortgage his lands to the Abbot of St. Mary's at York; and that the next day he must lose his estate unless he can pay to the abbot four hundred pounds. Here the knight sheds tears, and turns to go away. Little John, Scathelock, and Much the miller's son, weep along with him for pity. But Robin orders them to fill with the best wine, and swears

"By hym that me made,

And shope both sonne and mone."

Then the knight has a loan made to him of four hundred pounds, by his host; and also has given to him cloth of every color, and a horse to carry his presents, likewise a pair of boots. Little John adds a pair of gilt spurs, and accompa nies the knight on his journey. Thus ends the first fytte. In the second fytte, the abbot tells his convent that twelve months ago he made a loan to a knight of four hundred pounds on his land; and that now he expects to have the land forfeited to him. And he seems to have provided himself with legal means for hastening and securing the forfeiture. The prior hopes the abbot will not exact it, and be so light of conscience. The abbot answers the prior, that he is always in his beard. A fat-headed monk, the high-cellarer, swears that the knight is either dead or hung, and that they shall have his four hundred pounds a year to spend in their abbey. The High Justice of England is in waiting as a legal officer, and avers that he will undertake to say that the knight will not come yet. Just at this moment he does arrive, meanly dressed, and looking very sad. He entreats the abbot for a little longer time for payment, but is refused. He prays the Justice for his assistance, to prevent his being wronged; but the Justice is in some complicity with the abbot, and so refuses him, on which the knight starts up, and on a round table shakes four hundred pounds out of a bag.

"The abbot sat styll, and ete no more,

For all his ryall chere;

He cast his hede on his sholder,

And fast began to stare."

Then the knight went out of the abbey; and in the gateway probably he put on his good clothes, and left his old ones. there. He was very merry on his return home, to Uttersdale. At the gate, in the evening, his lady met him, and asked him if his goods were all lost.

"Be mery, dame, sayd the knyght,

And praye for Robyn Hode,

"That ever his soule be in blysse,

He holpe me out of my tene;
Ne had not be his kyndenesse,
Beggers had we ben."